Developer Spotlight: Marc Bolh of DataVault Password Manager

iMore's developer spotlights are like DVD/iTunes Extras for the App Store -- a weekly look behind the scenes at the programers and designers that bring you the iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad apps and games you love. This week, Leanna talks with Marc from DataVault Password Manager.

What's your name?
Marc Bolh. That's me in the photo. Be one of the first 3 to guess the city
it's taken in and we'll give you a promo code for one of our iOS apps. Guess
the monument I'm standing in front of and you'll be christened the
control-click Champion J

What's your company's name?
Ascendo. People often ask how we got the name. I started with a list of
Latin words, looking for attributes of the company I wanted to create. Then
made a short list of tweaked forms and sent it to friends for comments.
Three people said one of my favorites sounded like a female hygienic
product. Go figure. I knew then that user feedback was going to be
important.

Where are you located?
The company was incorporated in San Diego, California, it's spiritual home.
I have since moved live in Burlington, Vermont, a great place but fewer palm
trees. On the bright side, there are less distractions from making great
software. Oleg and Yurii, who develop DataVault and Ascendo Money, live in
Kharkov, Ukraine, another great place to develop software. Andrey, who
develops our multilingual dictionaries lives in Novosibirsk, Russia (head
for Mongolia then hook a left). Alli, who manages customer success is from
Mobile, Alabama.

How long have you been a developer?
I started Ascendo in 2002 but the road to apps was a winding one. We started
focusing 100% on apps in 2007.

I do everything but program at Ascendo, most of my time is spent in design
and testing.

Oleg, Yurii and Andrey are the coding geniuses who make the magic.

How long have you been an iOS developer?

I got a degree in computer science and worked as a developer for a few years. Then I worked in sales for Oracle, Microsoft and Openwave before starting Ascendo in 2002.

Oleg, Andrey and Yurii are the coding geniuses who develop our apps. Alli is the hero who makes sure our customers are successful. My job is to make sure they have what they need to deliver great software and support.

Do you develop for any other platform in addition to iOS? If so,
which one(s)?
Android, BlackBerry, Mac, Windows

What primary computer setup do you use for your iOS development?
MacBook Pro, 27-inch display, solid-state drive, all the fixins.

What iOS device(s) do you personally use most often?
My iPhone of course, iPad when I can get it away from the kids.

What mobile devices, other than iOS, do you currently use?
I like zoning out in the car and letting my Tom Tom do the work. My GTI
Fahrenheit with Ascendo plates, highly mobile device. I've got a Samsung 2S
and Sony Ericsson Arc on loan, very nice screens.

What's your favorite thing about developing for iOS?
The crisp retina screen and smooth screen transitions make the device a
pleasure to develop for. The passionate user are a great source of
motivation. The fact that we can focus on the app and not portability is a
big plus.

What's your least favorite thing about developing for iOS?
Provisioning profiles and security certificates. About as much fun as
figuring out your taxes.

What feature would you most like Apple to add to the iOS 5 SDK?
Better API for mobile Safari so we could auto-fill forms without
multitasking or developing a separate browser.

What feature would you most like Apple to add to the App Store?
Paid Updates! This is critical to developers, users and the App Store
itself. Everybody likes free stuff but developers need the means to invest
in new features and support, much of which is caused by OS upgrades and
other factors out of their control. Without paid updates, developers are
faced with moving to new products or getting overwhelmed by their own user
base, that's not good for anybody.

Like many developers we are frustrated that Apple and Google have moved
slowly on this. The first one to offer paid updates will benefit from a huge
shift in the allocation of development resources.

If we were to eavesdrop on you while you were coding, what curse
word would we hear you use the most?
Putain de merde! Ok, I lived in France for 12 years.

What do you do when you're not coding iOS apps?

Play guitar, try to close down nuclear plants, and occasional attempts at stand-up comedy.

What should we look for from you next? (Tease away!)
iCloud Sync for DataVault. Ascendo offers more sync options than any other
password manager and we working to get iCloud sync out the door as soon as
possible. Cloud sync is a great enabler for security products. It allows
users to access their data on multiple devices without having to store their
private information on a single, hosted server, aka hacker-magnet.

On the dictionary side, we’ll be building out enhancements to allow users create content like phrases and usage examples and share them with others.

Former app and photography editor at iMore, Leanna has since moved on to other endeavors. Mother, wife, mathamagician, even though she no longer writes for iMore you can still follow her on Twitter @llofte.

Seriously, this dev charges $9.99 for his app and wants MORE money for updates? Pure greed.
First, iOS updates (major ones, that only sometimes require re-coding anyways) are only once a year. You sell say 100,000 copies in a year or 2 at $10 a piece, totaling $1 million (Apple takes $300k still leaving the dev $700,000) and you're complaining that you want to charge for updates?
Even after paying pure costs of development (not the dev's personal time), that's more than the average American makes in a few years.
Sorry, but no one will apps priced at $10 and then tolerate charging for updates. Updates, not due to additional app features but merely a slight OS change, are your DUTY as a dev.
Customers will speak by buying competitor apps that don't lamely charge for updates on top of an already expensive entry price to buy.

So if you get paid to work on Monday your boss should expect you to work for free on Tuesday? If you buy a 2011 Ford you should get the 2012 Ford for free?
DataVault 1.x is $10. If they spend time and effort to make 2.x, they deserve to get paid for that effort and if you disagree, just don't buy it.
Adobe won't give you CS 6 for free. Microsoft won't give you Office 2012 for free. Just like they expect to be paid and you expect to get paid, iOS developers expect to get paid.
And they need to or we'll stop getting good software. And we'll be the ones to blame.

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To u guys that think its fake...yall haven't seen the whole vid.....he starts bleeding.....then she starts riding him....she looks tiny compared to it... I feel bad for the guy....but the guy likes it...hea not clenching or nething...crazy...if I find the longer vid ill post a link on here

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